MOTHRA VS. GODZILLA
(Mosura Tai Gojira)
April 29, 1964
(Mosura Tai Gojira)
April 29, 1964
1962's King Kong vs. Godzilla was a massive hit in Japan and prompted Toho to continue making movies starring their monster king. To mimic the success, it was decided that Godzilla be paired up with another popular creature co-star who previously had her own hit movie.
A typhoon washes a familiar giant egg off the coast of Japan and is quickly acquired by greedy business men who plan to use it as a tourist attraction. The egg of course belongs to Mothra and the Shobijin (played again by Emi and Yumi Ito) try to convince the men to return the egg, but to no avail. But a giant egg isn't the only thing that gets washed up, Godzilla also emerges and goes on a rampage throughout Japan. With the army helpless to stop him, Mothra may be Japan's only hope.
This movie goes back to having a more serious tone, but still keeps some touches of comedy.
Godzilla is back to being an antagonistic force of nature, attacking and killing indiscriminately. He sports one of the best looking suits from the Showa era (1954-1975), with it's prominent brows giving him a fitting menacing expression. It may just be some of Haruo Nakajima's finest work inside the suit, the way he moves looks natural and animalistic. Aside from a few faded optical effects, not since the original film has Godzilla been portrayed more threatening.
During a scene where the army attacks Godzilla, the suit actually catches on fire for a brief second and Nakajima didn't even notice it.
There's a genuinely great as well as entertaining cast of characters at work here. The first stand outs are a reporter named Sakai (Akira Takarada) and his photographer Junko (Yuriko Hoshi.) Most of the time Junko fumbles around with her camera often taking too long to set up a shot, much to Sakai's annoyance.
Our villains (Kenji Sahara & Yoshifumi Tajima), while not as over the top as Nelson, are still entertainingly despicable.
There's also this running gag with another reporter played by Yu Fujiki who always seems to be eating eggs, even keeping a few in his pocket.
Our leads are not without the more serious moments.
This movie continues with Ishiro Honda's theme of all of mankind being responsible for "playing with the devil's fire" as the natives of Infant Island refuse the request to have Mothra help the people of Japan after having nuclear bombs tested on their island. It's only after Junko and Sakai bare their souls and plead with the islanders to not turn their back on the world and that only by joining each other in one brotherhood can the world defeat the greatest evil, another of Honda's beliefs.
What follows is one of the most entertaining monster battles put to film. While Nakajima in a suit fighting a giant moth puppet seems like it wouldn't look that great, but through a combination of the right movements, different camera speeds and close up shots of smaller scale puppets, Mothra moves quite naturally. Think about the last time an insect flew around you and you sway about trying to shoo it off, this faster paced fight is great at simulating this motion.
Even the fight at the end with Godzilla fighting off Mothra's offspring, while it may be controversial to most fans, is very well done.
Now, I have to talk about the American release of this film. American International Pictures handled the distribution for this film and retitled the movie: 'Godzilla vs The Thing'. They even went as far as making a poster hiding the identity of Godzilla's opponent. It would have been amusing to see this movie in theaters back in the day just to see peoples reaction to seeing Mothra and not some John W. Campbell created monstrosity.
Things got a bit more confusing when in later DVD releases, the films title was changed again. This time to Godzilla vs. Mothra, which was also the name of a movie from Toho released in 1991. Thankfully the last DVD from Classic Media used the original title 'Mothra vs. Godzilla' but I still always have to correct people on the title differences.
Another interesting change was the inclusion of a scene exclusive to the American cut. The scene featured the United States military using their 'Frontier Missiles' to attack Godzilla. Even though Toho themselves helped with the filming of this scene, it has never been included in a Japanese cut of this film.
Mothra vs. Godzilla is often considered to be one of if not the best of the original Godzilla series. Even though I prefer some of the other films more than this one, it's not hard to see why this is considered to be one of the best. Hell, I'd easily put this somewhere in my Top 10 Godzilla films.
Both Godzilla and Mothra were now household names and it would only take 7 months before they would meet again for one of their greatest battles ever.
This movie goes back to having a more serious tone, but still keeps some touches of comedy.
Godzilla is back to being an antagonistic force of nature, attacking and killing indiscriminately. He sports one of the best looking suits from the Showa era (1954-1975), with it's prominent brows giving him a fitting menacing expression. It may just be some of Haruo Nakajima's finest work inside the suit, the way he moves looks natural and animalistic. Aside from a few faded optical effects, not since the original film has Godzilla been portrayed more threatening.
During a scene where the army attacks Godzilla, the suit actually catches on fire for a brief second and Nakajima didn't even notice it.
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| Left to Right: Hiroshi Koizumi, Emi & Yumi Ito, Yuriko Hoshi & Akira Takarada |
Our villains (Kenji Sahara & Yoshifumi Tajima), while not as over the top as Nelson, are still entertainingly despicable.
There's also this running gag with another reporter played by Yu Fujiki who always seems to be eating eggs, even keeping a few in his pocket.
Our leads are not without the more serious moments.
This movie continues with Ishiro Honda's theme of all of mankind being responsible for "playing with the devil's fire" as the natives of Infant Island refuse the request to have Mothra help the people of Japan after having nuclear bombs tested on their island. It's only after Junko and Sakai bare their souls and plead with the islanders to not turn their back on the world and that only by joining each other in one brotherhood can the world defeat the greatest evil, another of Honda's beliefs.
Even the fight at the end with Godzilla fighting off Mothra's offspring, while it may be controversial to most fans, is very well done.
Things got a bit more confusing when in later DVD releases, the films title was changed again. This time to Godzilla vs. Mothra, which was also the name of a movie from Toho released in 1991. Thankfully the last DVD from Classic Media used the original title 'Mothra vs. Godzilla' but I still always have to correct people on the title differences.
Another interesting change was the inclusion of a scene exclusive to the American cut. The scene featured the United States military using their 'Frontier Missiles' to attack Godzilla. Even though Toho themselves helped with the filming of this scene, it has never been included in a Japanese cut of this film.
Mothra vs. Godzilla is often considered to be one of if not the best of the original Godzilla series. Even though I prefer some of the other films more than this one, it's not hard to see why this is considered to be one of the best. Hell, I'd easily put this somewhere in my Top 10 Godzilla films.
Both Godzilla and Mothra were now household names and it would only take 7 months before they would meet again for one of their greatest battles ever.
Till next time, I've been your host Gryphon
and thank you for joining me here in my Lair
So long...
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